"Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our world will be progress toward more pain." -George Orwell, 1984

"Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our world will be progress toward more pain." -George Orwell, 1984

73 hours without electricity. I'm exhausted... can't sleep in the steamy heat. Myself and many of my neighbors spent the last two nights on our porches or talking out in the streets. I think we've all gotten about 10 hours sleep in the last 72 or so.

"Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our world will be progress toward more pain." -George Orwell, 1984

Glad you have AC back with the power, Eric. Now life can start again. Bet the cats were outraged at the lack of normal comforts and blamed it all on you, of course.

The cats were definitely not liking the break in normal routine.

striker, on 14 September 2017 - 05:51 AM, said:

Good to see you're back Eric, how are the cats doing?

Fine and dandy. Happy it's cool and back to the routine.

OK, so here we go...

Eric's Hurricane Irma Adventure

It started for me on Friday the 8th. That's when I decided that this storm was definitely coming into the neighborhood. I started preparing as well as I could... water, ice, sources of light, stowing away items outside, etc. Then Saturday came and I began to wish that I had done something to protect my house on the northern exposure (the side where the winds would be the worst). A friend offered me some HEAVY duty steel panels that he had in his backyard. These things are 40" by 14' long. They weigh about 75-100 lbs each. It took four of us (me, two neighbors, and my brother) to secure them to the front of the house using 3.5" tapcons screwed right into the concrete blocks.

So, now it's Saturday evening. About 7PM the winds start to howl and the howling increases by the hour. Thing started hitting the panels and making a helluva racket. My electricity went bye-bye at 8:05PM. At 1AM on Sunday morning the winds peaked. We were getting gusts of 70-80mph. They would come in bursts every 10 or 15 seconds apart. You could hear them coming about 3 seconds before they were on top of you. It sounded like a freight train accompanied by 500 screaming banshees. It was not a pleasant thing to experience.

Finally, about 3AM things mellowed out a bit. The storm was moving further north. The gusts were down to about 45-55mph and shifting from the previous direction of N to S to a more NW to SE direction. Oh, and the rain... sheets and sheets of it blowing around and 50+mph. The yard was saturated by then, ditches over-flowing, streets crowning over, etc. I finally got to sleep about 3:30AM or so.

I woke at about 7:30AM and proceeded out-of-doors to inspect the damages. The house was fine. The trees were a bit beat up, but OK. The tarps on my truck never moved. I had them tied down really well. The cleanup began. Everyone on the block was outside picking up debris, dragging tree branches to the street, using chainsaws, machetes, etc.

"Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our world will be progress toward more pain." -George Orwell, 1984

"Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery and torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but more merciless as it refines itself. Progress in our world will be progress toward more pain." -George Orwell, 1984

Good thing none of those trees around your house came down as your house would of been hit by them.

Well, the strong winds were primarily out of the north, so I was only worried about that big old oak out front. That's also why I only protected my northern windows. Anyway, the big old oak out front just got a much needed trimming and thinning out. It'll probably be good for it. I expect it to fill back up beautifully come spring.

That oak tree branch look like it would crush the house. It is a fine looking old oak be a shame to lop of the offending branches.Would you have to pay taxes if you made a tree house and lived in it ?

Actually, that tree is only 65 years old. The big ones in my back yard were grown from acorns in 1987. They're relatively young and supple compared to the old guy out front. Now, the tree that used to be on the other side of my front yard was old when this house was built in 1953. Sadly, the city came by and chopped it down back in 2013. I miss that old tree a lot. There were many tree houses in that thing... my brother's before me and then three others that I had up there. All of us neighborhood kids grew up in that old tree. It had a tire swing, too.

Well there may be more light but the older pic certainly looks much better than the palm tree shot. At least you had fun whilst a youngster.

The problem with that "more light" situation is that in the summertime in Florida, my front bedroom (the one in which I'm sitting right now at this keyboard) ROASTS in due to NO shade from the old oak anymore. In about 50 years, I'll have some shade from that little live oak the city planted for me as consolation for cutting down my old laurel oak.

This doesn't pertain to Irma, but generally to weather: it now looks like Jose may do another loop in the Atlantic and hit the coast of my state at the end of the week. It would most probably be post-tropical storm after it's time over cooler water, more like a nor'easter, but could have significant winds. It's like a zombie that won't die. And then there's Maria barreling through the Caribbean. At least furthest-east TS Lee is predicted to die in a couple of days. ARGH.